Nigerian job seekers encountering prejudice

Employers in the Latrobe Valley are finding the benefit of skilled migrants filling holes in their workforce, however spouses of these migrants are finding it difficult to secure work and settle in Gippsland. Many of the Nigerian community have found employment in the health and aged care sector but not all are so lucky.

Bosede Adetifa's husband had been working as a nurse in Africa since the 1980s.

When he was working in South Africa when he was interviewed for a job in Traralgon and was successful, at the time Bosede was working as a secretary in Nigeria.

Bosede says she expected to get a job in Traralgon based on her previous experience.

"I looked at [Australia] as a better place and I look at myself as somebody who will quickly get a job," she says.

However as rejection letters started to arrive she realised it would be more difficult than she first thought.

Bosede tried employment service providers and even welfare to help her study but she had no luck with either.

"I must say it was very depressing. I felt like basically like going to Nigeria," she says.

Bosede was spending a lot of time at home because she couldn't find work and started to feel socially isolated.

She explains that in her culture people spend a lot of time socialising with those around them, friends and neighbours, but she found it was different in Australia.

"Most of the time I was the only one in the house from morning till evening which wasn't fun at all," Bosede says.

Having received no feedback from her applications for work, Bosede says she started to feel unwanted and discriminated against.

"I feel that there was a bit of racism in there," she says.

Bosede says because her name is not typically English sounding, employers wouldn't look beyond her resume or give her an interview.

The search for work continued for two years before Bosede started to have children and employment took a back seat.

When her youngest child was old enough, she retrained and eventually found a job in aged care.

"I feel that people now know my worth. People appreciate me more because they get to know me, they get to understand me and that brings a lot of joy," she says.

She says many husbands and wives in the Latrobe Valley's Nigerian community support each other through similar situations, when one can find work but not the other.

"We basically don't accept defeat, we continue to struggle and just to believe that things will get better," she says.

Bosede says it's common for professionals from Nigeria to retrain as something completely different in Australia to fit the workforce needs.

She has seen doctors and IT specialists alike retrain to work in the aged care sector, where there are employment opportunities in the Latrobe Valley.

"Organisations do need aged care staff and so most of the African community that comes [to Australia] they basically go through aged care training before they could get any of the jobs around," she says.